Blue Ridge Books hosts open mic series

“Open Mic Nights” will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. on the first Thursday of each month beginning Nov. 4 at Blue Ridge Books on Main Street in Waynesville.

The series is hosted by Chris Minick and sponsored by The Haywood County Arts Council and the Music and Poetry Lover’s Network.

The events are free and open to the public; attendees will have the opportunity to make donations with all proceeds going to benefit the Arts Council’s JAM (Junior Appalachian Musicians) program that offers old time mountain music lessons on guitar, fiddle, and banjo to students in fourth grade and up.

Participants may begin signing up at 6:45 p.m. at the bookstore. For information call 452.0593 or 456.6000.

Reading Room

“In a time of universal deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”

— George Orwell

We live in an age — the relativity of truth — in which Orwell’s adage seems as dated as monocles or top hats. Just as Darwin’s theory of evolution led to Social Darwinism, a philosophy pitting one human being against another with survival of the fittest as the supreme law for success, so Einstein’s theory of relativity changed popular philosophy and cultural mores as radically as it did the study of physics.

This Must Be the Place

And, in many ways, I’m even weirder as an adult. Since day one, being weird is something I embrace. I’m proud of it, even though I don’t give it much thought, because I think being weird is normal, and being normal is, well, boring.